Classic Movie Review: David Cronenberg's 'Eastern Promises'

Kino Lorber is releasing a 4K Ultra HD and Blu Ray Release for David Cronenberg's exceptional, 2007 crime thriller, Eastern Promises starring Viggo Mortenson and Naomi Watts. This new release of Eastern Promises was approved and graded by cinematographer Peter Suschitzky and features a new round of bonus features talking about the making of Eastern Promises. The 4K Ultra HD and Blu Ray release of Eastern Promises will be available on March 22nd, 2022. With that, here is a look back at Eastern Promises.

A History of Violence brought director David Cronenberg back into the light after years of toil on the fringe of horror and violence. A History of Violence was a step away from the kind of horror movies that David Cronenberg had long been associated with. However, he kept his violence graphic and shocking. What changed was Cronenberg's focus from merely scaring audiences to using violence to enhance drama. In A History of Violence it was violence visited upon the secrets of a Midwestern farm family, the last bastion of supposed all American values.

In Cronenberg's follow-up film, Eastern Promises, it is violence visited upon innocents, a teenage runaway, a baby, and a naïve doctor are each drawn into the web of dangerous men. Unlike the deconstructive approach to the dynamic of good and evil in A History Violence, which played like both a crime thriller and a bleak satire of Midwestern values, Eastern Promises is relatively straightforward in its examination of good and evil.

The story kicks off when a 14 year old girl wanders into a London pharmacy. The girl is pregnant and bleeding, ready to give birth. Rushed to the hospital, the young girl dies on the operating table after giving birth to a baby girl. With no identification, the 14 year old has left little clue as to her identity and thus to whom the baby girl belongs. The only clues left to the girl's identity are a diary written in Russian script and a card from a Russian restaurant.

Searching for the young girl's family is the hospital midwife Anna (Naomi Watts). First she must convince her uncle, Stepan (Jerzy Skolimowski), to translate the diary. Meanwhile, following her other lead to the Russian restaurant brings Anna face to face with the head of the Russian mafia in London, Semyon (Armin Mueller Stahl), though she is unaware of his status.

Semyon's extraordinary interest in getting his hands on the diary, though he claims not to know the teenage girl, puts Anna on edge immediately. Increasing her nervousness is the frightening appearance of Semyon's son Kirill (Vincent Cassell) and his driver and bodyguard, Nikolai (Viggo Mortenson). Though suspicious of Semyon's motives she allows him to read a copy of the diary, soon his pursuit of the real diary will bring danger to Anna and her family.

That description is about as much as I can tell you about Eastern Promises without stepping on the film's many mysteries and surprises. I can also tell you that my description is slightly misleading. Though I portray the story as being about Anna, the girl, and the baby, the real story is about Viggo Mortenson's Nikolai; a complicated, cold hearted, and ambitious mobster.

Working as the driver to the boss's son is clearly not Nikolai's real agenda. What Nikolai has in mind and how Viggo Mortenson plays these motivations is the most fascinating aspect of Eastern Promises. As great as Mortenson was in Cronenberg's masterful A History Of Violence, he is even better in Eastern Promises. With a menacing presence and puzzling poker face, Mortenson's Nikolai is as dangerous for his physical violence as for his mental acuity.

There is a plot twist in Steven Knight's script for Eastern Promises but don't expect anything remotely "M. Night Shyamalan". The way director David Cronenberg plays this 'twist' is by not making it much of a secret. Allowing the audience to guess ahead is actually a clever bit of misdirection on Cronenberg's part that allows the film time to set up the next bit of shocking violence while holding our attention elsewhere. The idea is that we in the audience take a moment to think ahead and then are shocked back into the moment by violence.

Gimmicky? Maybe, but it works.

Cronenberg's violence is of a horror film quality, only more gritty and realistic. Cronenberg is clearly fascinated with the way violence really takes place, hand to hand, in the most visceral manner. Particularly striking is a fight set inside a steam room with Mortenson fighting a pair of thugs with knives. The violence builds slowly and tensely to a crescendo that is surprisingly suspenseful. Most movies leave you thinking that the protagonist is going to escape safely but there is still something in the staging of this fight that keeps you guessing and holding your breath. It’s a masters class of direction.

If David Cronenberg had directed The Godfather it would have looked a lot like Eastern Promises. The difference is merely in scale. Where Coppola worked his drama like a grand operatic tragedy, filling an entire hall, Cronenberg directed Eastern Promises like an opera performed by a bar band in some seedy dive. Everything is of a slightly lower order but works just as dramatically and often more shockingly. That's not to say one movie is better than the other, rather that the to movies are very similar in story and quality while being very different in scope and scale.

Eastern Promises features the best work of Viggo Mortenson’s career. Even as A History of Violence established Mortenson as an unpredictable and fascinating lead actor and The Lord of the Rings threatened to turn him into a hunky movie star due to his terrifically charismatic performance, Eastern Promises features Viggo Mortenson as an actor, a master of craft and a performer who can transfix an audience simply with his presence and gravity.

Mortenson has had a few standout roles since Eastern Promises but it’s been mostly underwhelming fare like Captain Fantastic and the desperately overrated Oscar winner Green Book that have dominated his career. Thankfully, this year, 2022, marks a reunion with director David Cronenberg. Mortenson and an all star cast, including Kristen Stewart and Lea Seydoux, are set to star in a horror movie called Crimes of the Future for David Cronenberg later this year.

There are few details at the moment, but just the idea of Mortenson and Cronenberg back together has me excited. If Crimes of the Future can live up to the lofty standards of A History of Violence and Eastern Promises, we are in for something very, very good. There is no release date yet for Crimes of the Future but with Eastern Promises arriving on a new 4K Ultra Blu Ray release from Kino Lorber and Crimes of the Future coming sometime later this year, fans of Viggo Mortenson have a lot to be excited about.

Pick up either or both the 4K Ultra HD or brand new Blu Ray release of Eastern Promises in stores everywhere and online everywhere on March 22nd from Kino Lorber. Eastern Promises is a must have for any film collector.